


No Greater Heaven

by SassafrassRex (Serbajean)



Series: Purchased, Traded, Wagered, Won [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Abuse, And maybe kinda dark, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Kinda, Meh not really, Physical Abuse, Pre-Voltron, Shiro (Voltron)'s Missing Year, Speculative, Stream of Consciousness-ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-31
Updated: 2016-07-31
Packaged: 2018-07-28 08:00:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7631677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serbajean/pseuds/SassafrassRex
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Take your joys in the boldness of your children.</p><p>OR</p><p>Someone’s been misbehaving.<br/>Someone needs a talking-to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Greater Heaven

**Author's Note:**

> Voltron hell, just like the rest of us.  
> Now, brace for angry, rambling madness from an angry, maddened old lady.

“You hate me.”

His eyes were dim. He was bleeding. Greasy, blackened burns painted up his left side and down his arm. His outburst had been subdued with impressive prejudice, and his efforts had won him nothing. Yet, she could tell he was pleased with himself. He knelt quietly in the corner, head hung low with his arms bound behind him. Chained down to the floor, he was the very picture of penitence. Still in his traitorous heart, he was satisfied with what he’d done today. She could see it in his dim, dull,  _stupid_  eyes.

Callow, petty, unruly little cur. They had been making such progress. Truly, they had. He’d been coming along beautifully.

She pondered if he could he have been biding his time for this? Planning?

Too preposterous. She watched him far too closely for that (after all, she hung onto everything he did). And if today’s rather pathetic attempt had been the culmination of careful planning and preparation, then she had sorely overestimated his capabilities. If this was his best, then she did not know him as well as she thought she did.

But she  _did_  know him, and this had been simple spontaneity. He’d seen an opportunity—one of the sort that he shouldn’t even be looking for, any longer—and he had acted. A chance to hurt her (to undermine her, to  _humiliate_  her). A chance to assert his own feeble will, and to oblivion with the consequences.

Remarkable.

She noticed he was wheezing. There was blood on his mouth. He would need care, presently. But this came first. Damned fool, what was she going to do with him?

“I rescued you. You know this. I healed you, I lifted you up. But all you see in me is your jailer.” His shoulders hunched and his jaw worked as he stared at the floor. Yes, he hated her. How he hated her.

Quick as a flash, she turned her ire on him and loosed it. Her hard little fist came swinging across, to slam him right down to the floor. “You hate me so much. Why, then you must want to leave me.”

His eyes weren’t focusing. In his dizziness, he couldn’t coordinate his bound arms to right himself. And he was not listening. Damn him, had he always been so willful? Had she silvered her memories of his earlier days?

She grabbed his shoulder (the burned one, as it happened—she squeezed harder than was strictly necessary) and wrenched him back upright in a display of strength that mocked her thin frame. His head lolled only once as she resettled him to kneeling and took stock.

His eyes were still foggy, looking off somewhere to his right. So, she seized hold of his hair and knocked his head back against the wall.  _Crack!_

And she did it again,  _crack!,_ before he was willing to give her his attention. “Do you  _want_  to go back where I took you from? Would you want that, just to be rid of me?” His eyes widened slightly. It was an old threat, one oft used. But he knew better than to think it idle.

He knew better than to think any of her threats idle.

“Well, would you?” She grabbed him and placed her face close to his. “You disappointed a great many people, today. Today was to be a triumph. Today, my master was to  _see_  you. And, willfully, you failed.” She held him still, though he squirmed and tried to shrink from her. “Time and again, you make me fight them for your sake. Fight them to  _keep_  you!”

Drawing back up, she began to pace. “Yet, how can I? They’ve seen you, they know what you are.” He began to tremble. “They say I should take away the gifts I gave you. Strip you bare and leave you _crawling,_ drop you down a hole like I did my others.” He tried to speak, but then all that came out was a torrent of coughing. She just raised her voice over the noise, “One more failed experiment, left to rot like so much refuse! Is that what you want?”

“No!” The word was wet. He spat it out with a smattering of red. “No, I-”

“Cast off and forgotten, like you never were.” She heaped her scorn upon him, heavier and heavier. “You want so terribly to be rid of me? Damn your eyes, I  _fought for you!”_

“ _NO!_ ”

Finally.

“Don’t! Don’t send me-”

She had begun to doubt.

“I can-… Just-…  You don’t need to send me back.” His voice sounded like a gurgling stream. It dripped red down his chin. Had they knocked out his teeth? Oh, she would have words for them if they had. Or was it his lungs?

“They want you gone. They call you _pariah_.”

“I can-” He lurched forward, brought up short by the chain that held his cuffs to the floor. “Don’t. Don’t send me away, I  _can-_ ” She saw him brace, “I can do better.”

She turned and waited. He pressed her, eyes turning wild, “I can! Don’t send me back. I’ll do better, I’ll be better. Don’t send me away.”

He let his head drop. “Please. You don’t need to send me away.”

She held her ground. He’d let her down, they both knew it. She’d put so much of her faith in what he could be. In what she’d seen in him when she had first dragged him up from the muck. Would she ever bring it out? Was it still even there?

She sighed into the quiet, heavy as stone.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

Words.

Always with his words.

Before she first laid claim to him, she’d heard “Get away from me!”, “I won’t!”

In the interim days, before he gave in, she’d heard “No!”, “Don’t!”, “Stop!” And she’d heard “Damn you!” and other, less familiar iterations thereof (ugly words; his home must be an unenlightened place). She’d heard “I’ll kill you!” and “I’ll kill all of you! I swear, I’ll kill you!” And she’d heard roaring and choking with no words at all. She’d heard begging.

And now, when he behaved, she mostly heard “Yes”, “No”, “Yours”, and variations on the theme of “No, I don’t want to go back.”

His words had always been simple but she understood more than enough. She remembered the day he first gave in.

And she would remember today also. When he tried to take it all back.

Capricious little tramp. She gave a chuckle that was more of a snarl. He had a strong will, her chosen. She would think it subdued, only for it to then reemerge without warning, like a relapsing disease. Sorry, was he? What good was this?

She could see him trying to calm himself down (he’d always been so preoccupied with control). “I’ll do better.” He breathed deep. Or tried, but it set him to coughing. “I won’t,” the words were wet, barely intelligible, “fail again.”

Words, words. Promises, promises. So much time. So much effort. Where had she gone wrong?

* * *

She’d first seen him, purely by chance. Some unremarkable visit to her lord (she couldn’t even remember the reason). She’d watched this child’s work and she could not abide the waste of potential. Such a poor, dumb animal he’d been, back then. And how he did snarl and spit, but she saw past that. He was an impulse purchase, true, but then, she was a gambler. In her line of duties, she’d learned to trust her instincts.

She snatched him up, and she set to learning every piece of him. She examined and discovered everything he had, everything he could withstand, and everything he could  _give_. She saw that she’d been right to take him. And she was given leave (how generous was her master?) to draw out what she’d uncovered.

So, she took her find down into the dark and, under her careful direction, he was unmade.

She orchestrated all of it (though she kept herself hidden, and never let him see). She dropped him down into the depths of her hold, where he could stew. She had her people open him up and scoop out his self, handful after rotting, necrotic handful (though she never let him see). Solitude worked wonders, she knew. As did pain. As did fear. She guided their hands, and faithfully, tirelessly, they bent and pushed and twisted and snapped. And she wove the darkness into a monster and set it upon him (though not once, did she let him see).

Solitude, pain, fear. Simple things, really. And the carefully controlled administration of gentle comfort (never too much; just enough to shatter). She knew just what to do, just what pieces to take, until he safely came crumbling down.

Because eventually he did wear himself out, flinging his will against indestructible walls. Resisting when he knew that he didn’t _need_ to resist. When he knew that rescue and relief stood just beyond his sight. Always, shestood just beyond his sight, waiting to embrace him whenever he was ready.

Even still, he kept his fight up so fiercely.

She watched and endured, until the day dawned (at last, at last) that he bent his proud neck and lowered his head. And before her shining eyes, he reached for her in supplication. Clear as the morning, she heard him,  _I’m sorry I fought. I’m empty,_ _now._

_I’m sorry, please help me_

And she took him in her arms and finally, finally she could make it right. She spirited him away from the darkness, to somewhere she could begin to raise him back up. To tenderly return the strength that had been flayed off his bones and re-forge the broken pieces into something that would be unbreakable.

She sang to him during those early nights and her words chilled the blood in his veins.

The places she would take him. The wonder she would build of him. She promised to make him shine as to outclass the stars. So brightly that people all over the universe could catch the light he gave.

Or could burn, if they turned to flee from it.

* * *

It all should have been simpler than this.

Truly. He’d been lost, he’d been receptive. An empty vessel to be filled and named, and it should have been the simplest thing to etch her words onto his heart and make him bright and strong.  _Why_  wouldn’t he listen? She’d seen it in him. She knew she had. _Why_  wasn’t he ready? Oh what was she going to  _do_ with him?

She curled her hands into fists. In the time that she’d been silent he’d started to drift. His eyes were half-open and, despite his apparent fear, his head was drooping.

The gall. She snarled and with a fist in his hair, she yanked him back to attention. “You do understand, do you not? That crime reaps punishment? That actions have consequences? It _is_ obstinacy that drives you to behave this way, not stupidity?” He tugged his head away, to draw further into himself. Stubborn.

Even now—with his atonement and pleading and his worthless  _promises_  echoing about the room—even _now,_  he still didn’t want to listen. Still didn’t want to grow. He was so close, how could he withhold it from her now? He was meant to be stronger. He should have been beautiful. But here he knelt, low and vulgar and shameful, instead. What could she hope to make of him, when he was _this?_  This pathetic mess, this aimless waste how  _dare he?_

She swung hard, to backhand him against the wall,  _crack!,_  once again. As he ricocheted, she caught him up, both her hands around his throat. His fogged eyes turned bright when she started squeezing.

What could she do? He’d been a gamble, what could she do? Give up and be done with him? Release him from his constant fears and spare her the pain of his weakness? How she hated his weakness.

He was so close. He was. But would he ever be _ready?_ Here he was, kneeling at her feet and trembling. _Cowering_  like a wretch. Working his soundless mouth while she choked the life from him. Accusing her, pleading with her.

For what? To let him alone? To kill him outright? To forgive him and take him back to herself? What did he want, what did he need?

What- what could he _possibly need_  that she had not given him? So much, she had done… He certainly didn’t resemble her inspiration now, did he?

With a curse, she ripped her hands from his neck. He pitched forward and hunched low, hacking and spitting and making a mess. Striding away, she fumed. He owed her more than this. More than a quiet death in a cell. He owed her more than this disgrace. 

Dragging his breath, he offered again, “I’m sorry.” His voice was like wet, shifting gravel.

“Actions have consequences.”

_What haven't I given you?_

“Don’t send me away.” It was just a ragged whisper. “Don’t.”

She turned to kneel before him. Blood welled up from the jagged abrasions she’d just left on his throat. Before long, her handprints would appear. A dark collar, announcing her recrimination to anyone who looked at him. She leaned close to his face, “You are a wretched child. A wretched, hateful little boy, stagnant and stubborn and slothful.” She took hold of his jaw with one hand. “I  _prayed_  for someone with talent like yours. With potential.” He tried to twist his head away, but she didn’t let him. Hand like a vice, she hissed, “Someone to step beyond the failing flesh and the weak heart. Someone I would make splendid!”

Spittle flew from her mouth as she derided him, “How deeply must I have sinned, that the gods gave me you. To  _know_  what you could be!” She shoved his head away. _Crack!_

“And to see what you are.”

She turned away and stood. “Yes, I think you must hate me very much.”

He did. He did and he did and he did, she knew it quite well.

And in some strange way, that bothered her. He hadn’t always, after all. She remembered holding him and whispering to him, when he was at his lowest. She remembered how he’d reached for her, how he’d crushed her hand in his, when he was lost in the pain of the gifts he received.

He had broken every one of her fingers.

She’d loved him then and she loved him still, though now he hated her. Now he would heap ruin upon himself, just to spite her.

“I want greatness for you! I want to mold you into something the universe has never seen!” She ought not to lose her temper. But damn him. Damn him. She flung her arms out, “Yet you thwart me! So resolved you are, to be nothing and no one. To remain nothing and no one. I offer you something better. I’ve raised you up from the dirt, yet in your heart you’ve decided you would rather have  _stayed there, in the dirt!”_

How could she get through to him? What did he need from her?

“Don’t send me away.” He was getting blood all over. “I’ll do it right. I’ll do it better.”

“I gave you everything that you are. I _fought_ for you! I fought for you and you spat on me. What good is your word?”

But in the wake of her threats, he’d felt the dark whispering (it wanted his return) and clawing at him (when would he be back?) and his fear rose higher than ever it had before. “Don’t send me back! You know I can do it right. You don’t need to.” He strained toward her. “Take it away, then. Take it all, take back everything you ever gave me. Take more! Leave me nothing, just don’t send me.” 

“Be quiet,” she told him, for his wanton alarm made her head ache. But he persisted,

“Tell me what to do! Punish me how you like, I won’t fail again!”

“Be quiet!”

“ _Don’t_  send me back!”

She rounded on him like thunder, “I tell you, hold your tongue!”

Imbued with the force of her will, the shout slammed him back against the wall. For the fifth time, she heard his head go  _crack!_ and he slumped low at her feet, gasping out wisps of a red fog.

But quiet, finally.

Rotten little horror. What was she going to do with him?

She breathed deep. Then she breathed deep again. “Actions have consequences.” She shook her head and slowly lowered herself to the floor. She found, quite abruptly, that she’d run out of vigor and vitriol to spend on her charge, disobedient, though he still was. Her pique faded, and she wilted to a weary old woman. Burdened with disappointment, she sat across from her frightened, faltering child. Her well-loved, worthless disaster. She settled herself down and her joints creaked when her bones ground against themselves. 

He was pressing the side of his face into the wall behind him, twisted as far from her as he could manage. Resistant still, but she would defeat him. She was the monster, and she, the deliverer. With both hands, she reached out to insistently turn his head towards hers. She saw mist. Mist from his gasping mouth and mist in his clouding eyes. His pupils didn’t match, though no surprise after the day he’d had. Softly, she ran her thumbs over his cheeks and caught a tear from each eye (the only two he’d allowed, throughout all of the day’s madness).

She had finished with reproach.

“Whose are you?”

His breath hitched. Blood surrounded his mouth, much of it still new and wet. His efforts to recoil smeared it on both her palms.

She shook him lightly. “Whose are you?”

His trembling (how could he _still_ be trembling?), it eased, if only by the slightest increment. Familiarity. Security. Careful comfort.

“Yours.”

She smiled. “Yes, you’re mine. You’ll always be mine. And what are you, to me?”

His shivering ratcheted back up. He still didn’t like to think of this part.

She shushed him, lightly running her claws down the sides of his face (wicked sharp as they were, she didn’t let them cut him).

“I’m-…” He didn’t want her comforting him. She had already claimed so much of what he was. He didn’t want her touching him. He didn’t want her near him. But where was he without her? Where could he run, to whom would he turn? He couldn’t go back in the dark. He  _couldn’t_  go back.

And he’d already had so little fight left in him.

She waited, tacitly calm, eternally patient. She waited for him like always, however long he took. She was old. She was wise. She would outlast him.

“What are you, to me?” She would prompt as much as was needed. She would not lose patience.

“I’m-…” He shut his eyes. “I’m your Champion.” His voice sounded like shattered glass.

“Yes.” She ran her fingers through his blood-stiffened hair and gently massaged his scalp, careful of the place where it had split under a heavy cudgel, earlier that day. “Yes, you are. You’re my Champion.” She held the contact and repeated her claim until she felt his muscles begin to unlock and heard his breath begin to even. He was tired, she knew. He was hurt and he needed rest.

She watched him blink, mismatched eyes settlling half-open and very weary. Her fingers moved softly through his hair as he quieted. Then, without warning, she flared up and swept her hands forward again, to take cruel hold of his jaw. This time, she did let her claws cut into him. He stopped breathing altogether and his eyes snapped wide. For a cruel instant, she wondered if now, he might cry.

He didn’t.

Good.

Still a recalcitrant fool, though.

“Actions  _do_ have consequences.”

Fear dragged at him. So, so little fight left to give. She loomed before his eyes, filling the room and crushing the air from his lungs. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think. What was she going to do with him?

“But as you  _are_  my Champion,” her claws sliced ten small gouges into his face, “I will protect you from those consequences. I will keep you from those who gainsay you. Whatever else you are, however you falter, I will always keep you from them.” With a quick jerk, she yanked her bloodied fingers free and he pitched forward.

Her burning eyes pinned his and she snarled, fierce like the dawn, “For as long as you are my Champion, I will  _never_  let them send you back.”

And with that, she did defeat him.

His head tipped and dropped low. He didn’t flinch away when her arms wrapped around him. “Though you kick and rage and scream every step of the way, still I will carry you. Just like I have.” She brought his face to her shoulder. “However I may choose to punish you,” she turned to speak in his ear, slowly and clearly, “and whatever should happen, you will never be sent back as long as you are mine.

“I promise you this.”

Giving her promise, her eyes softened, and she gazed off into the future she would build for him. The future he would build for her. “And one day, when you’re strong and bright and shining, and you eclipse them all, they will see you. They will _know_ , like I always did. And as to the naysayers, you will burn them away for their lack of vision. And _he_ will see.” Her heart danced at the thought of her master. “He’ll  _see_ you. And he’ll raise you up before him. And none will stand against you, _none_  will threaten you, forever after.”

She was rocking him back and forth. When had that started?

He shuddered through a breath, and his words managed to surprise her.

Not a stream. Not shifting gravel or shattered glass. Her child’s voice sounded like a broken heart,

“You’ll still be with me?”

She froze. For a moment, she was struck dumb.

But just for a moment. She tightened her arms on him, sank her claws in (he didn’t cringe, he didn’t tense). “I will  _never_  let anyone send you from my side. None will take you from me. And however much you hate me. However strong you grow or however deep you fall,

“I will never leave you, nor forsake you.”

She fought for him today. If need be, she would fight for him again tomorrow.

He sagged further in her arms and, as much as it may hurt, he was able to breathe again. Yes, he knew her anger could renew itself at any moment. Yes, her whims had always been treacherous and volatile, and there could be no real rest when she was near. Her ire was quick, and her comfort stung as often as it soothed. He knew all of this.

But he couldn’t keep his head up.

She wouldn’t renounce him. She wouldn’t send him away. She’d stay and protect him from the others. This would be enough.

His ears were thrumming and he hurt all over. He was shaking again. Her shoulder was sharp against his face and her hands were very cold.

“I’ve not punished you yet. But there is time enough for that tomorrow.”

He knew. He tried not to wonder.

“And I believe you’ve done enough for one day.” One very long, very taxing day. Whatever was she going to do with him?

She sighed one last time and pressed a kiss into his hair. Freezing weight spread from the spot like poison, stretching out to his fingers and toes. The feeling was nauseating and familiar and he loathed it entirely. But he breathed easier. The rawness all down his side was blunted, the buzzing in his head gentled. The ache in his bound hands disappeared and even the wailing sickness in his heart quieted, if only for the moment. This would be enough. She cradled his head as she lowered him to the floor. He only barely winced when he laid on his burns and straightened his cramped legs.

She ran her hands over his cheeks, over the cuts she’d made. In an instant, the lines stitched themselves together and were gone (it was biting ants, crawling under his skin. He hated it, too). Those on his throat, she left alone. Another reminder of this day. Hovering over him, her long, silvery hair fell around his face in a curtain. Her features swam and her eyes burned like coals, and the mien of tenderness she’d chosen to affect looked strange on her.

Running a hand over his head, she smiled. Some yet-wakeful part of him still knew to be frightened when she smiled.

“You never need fear anyone else, ever again.”

He tried to turn away and shut her out (but she could always see him). He tried to keep his eyes open (no rest, no rest with her, he didn’t want her seeing him) but she forced them closed.

“I will  _never_  leave you alone.”

* * *

She shut the door behind her and breathed deep. And she breathed deep again. The weariness surrounding her fell away and her eyes sharpened. She looked down at her hands, stained with since-dried blood. Peering at it, she muttered quietly and it sank into her skin and disappeared.

She grinned. How invigorating. Indeed, he was a trial. Quite a trial. But there was  _so much_ to him. So much for her. And she was patient. Yes, she would outlast him.

As she walked, she placed two calls, one to finally summon a physician (for although she’d put him to sleep, he was far from well) and one to requisition his cell’s security feed. She wanted to replay that whole conversation. Listen again, to the cadence of his voice. Take a second look at his expressions. Watch his anger, watch his fear, watch his eventual relief. Study all of him.

She smiled. This had been crucial encounter. Pivotal, even. Oh, he hated her still. Yes, he did. But he held no illusions as to his reliance on her regard and her care. And she would endure his hate quite readily. Because she knew, now more than ever, that he loved her also.

_I’m sorry, please help me._

_Be with me?_

He wasn’t lost. He was no failed attempt. Not in the least. A tenacious, intractable, unruly little monster, he was her very own.

She  _would_  make him to shine.

And it would all burn.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT: I broke down and made a [Tumblr.](http://sassafrassrex.tumblr.com/) Swing by and laugh at me.


End file.
